Bard/Lyric Thaumaturge/Sublime Chord

[tricktroller]

So I have been looking into playing a bard, and I have been looking into all kinds of different approaches. Is this one at all doable?

Bard 6/ Lyric Thaumaturge 4/Sublime Chord 10

In the game I will be playing bards get, trapfinding search and disable device as well as 2 more skill points per level. My skills maxed are.
Bluff
Diplomacy
Sense Motive
Disguise
UMD
Search
Disable Device
Knowledge (Arcana)
Perform (Sing)
Profession (Astrologer)
Listen
Spellcraft

feats so far are Nymph's Kiss and Melodic Casting.

Stats are
Str 10
Dex 14
Con 14
Int 16
Wis 11
Cha 18

I am looking at playing an Aasimar which in his world have no LA, but they don't get proficiency with every weapon. Do you guys think I can be an effective trapfinder/remover as well as some support in combat and through spells/buffs/songs?

[T.G. Oskar]

So I have been looking into playing a bard, and I have been looking into all kinds of different approaches. Is this one at all doable?

Bard 6/ Lyric Thaumaturge 4/Sublime Chord 10

In the game I will be playing bards get, trapfinding search and disable device as well as 2 more skill points per level. My skills maxed are.
Bluff
Diplomacy
Sense Motive
Disguise
UMD
Search
Disable Device
Knowledge (Arcana)
Perform (Sing)
Profession (Astrologer)
Listen
Spellcraft

feats so far are Nymph's Kiss and Melodic Casting.

Stats are
Str 10
Dex 14
Con 14
Int 16
Wis 11
Cha 18

I am looking at playing an Aasimar which in his world have no LA, but they don't get proficiency with every weapon. Do you guys think I can be an effective trapfinder/remover as well as some support in combat and through spells/buffs/songs?

Bard with Rogue stuff (8+Int and Trapfinding, I mean), plus Lesser Aasimar that STILL count as Outsiders. Interesting.

Here's the deal, tho: your Inspire Courage will suffer. A LOT. You're dropping 14 class levels worth of abilities: your Inspire Courage will, with some luck (or, rather, a Vest of Legends), grant a +2 to attack and damage rolls. If you can get it near to +4, you MIGHT want to consider Dragonfire Inspiration (Dragon Magic) for extra power. That shouldn't be so hard with a Vest of Legends, the Song of the Heart feat (if your DM allows it; it's an Eberron feat) and either Inspirational Boost (a 1st level Bard spell from Spell Compendium) or Badge of Valor (from the Magic Item Compendium). The reason is because Inspire Courage is one of the best Bard class features around, and with Melodic Casting you can keep the song and cast freely.

Second: Sublime Chord beyond 3rd level isn't so good. There's a good reason why Virtuoso is used to extend its power. 1st level nets you the spellcasting progression, while 2nd level nets you an extra use of Bardic Music and Song of Arcane Power, which is really powerful. Sublime Chords get poor BAB progression, and since you're already bleeding BAB, might as well get a stop-gap.

Which leads to the Third point: there's a good reason why a spellcaster Bard is ALWAYS tagged with Virtuoso. The entry requirements aren't so hard to pull off (just a few ranks in Intimidate and Diplomacy; you already have one maxed, the other only needs 4 ranks, and you already have the ability to cast 1st level spells so you'll qualify easily). You lose Disable Device, but then again, neither Lyric Thaumaturge nor Sublime Chord advance them, so you're not gonna be the ultimate trapbuster out there. In fact, I doubt they get Search either, so you may want to rethink your trapbusting strategy... Anyways: the two reasons why you want to get into Virtuoso is because it gets 9/10ths spellcasting progression: Bards get 3rd level spells by 7th level, so the loss of CL won't hurt THAT much, since you'll get full Sublime Chord progression. And, it ALSO stacks your Inspire Courage progression, so you end up with Bard + Virtuoso on your IC, making it better.

Think about the traditional Bard builds: notice they usually insist on Bard 9/Virtuoso 1/Sublime Chord 2/Virtuoso +8? With 18 levels and a Vest of Legends, a Bard gets full IC, better spellcasting and enough uses to matter (about 19 uses, because 2 levels of SC count as 1 for purposes of Bard). If you're gonna stick levels of Lyric Thaumaturge, you may need to sacrifice an additional level of Virtuoso (so you'd end up Bard 6/Virtuoso 8, and therefore with 14 effective Bard levels for IC; enough for a +3 bonus) since you'll have to delay your entry into Sublime Chord until 11th level, or sacrifice one level of Lyric Thaumaturge and lose the extra 3rd and 4th level spell slots. It's a shame it's not easier to get to Lyric Thaumaturge (say, entering from Bard 5), because Sonic Might is a pretty interesting class feature.

The build IS doable, but it's mostly deriving from a typical Sublime Chord build by losing Virtuoso (and a good chunk of IC) for 4 levels of Lyric Thaumaturge and a few lower-level spells, so it's like trading a masterwork lute for a masterwork guitar, pretty much. You'll have to think on boosting your IC or your spellcasting, but you won't be that good of a trapbuster barring loads of bonuses (Instant Locksmith is good for Open Lock but you have Knock on your spell list already; there's another good Bard spell that should help with your Search checks).

As for the feats...probably chime in with what most other people would say, and see if you can snatch Dragonfire Inspiration, though it'll be harder for you to justify since you're thinking of becoming an Aasimar. You CAN, though, justify getting Words of Creation (if you and your DM can arrange getting it from the Book of Exalted Deeds) and double that IC bonus, which should be more than enough (that is, by stomaching some points of non-lethal damage). Try to see if you can stretch both Words of Creation and Song of the Heart, which should leave you with three feats (Dragonfire Inspiration, Dragontouched and Draconic Heritage to snatch a draconic ancestor with sonic or force breath?)

[Socratov]

T. G. Oskar has already pointed out some things, but before I can help you I want to know what you want to be able to do. A bard is often called Jack of all Trades, Master of None. This, however, does not do the bard justice. A bard has within his perview things like: Fighting, Casting, Buffing, Social Interaction, (with your perks) Trapfinding/-Busting/Skillmonkey, Commanding. some things go better along then others: for instance: commanding, buffing and Social Interaction go great together, as do casting, buffing and Social Interaction. Often it's just a case of See list, get Social Interaction, pick 2 other to be great at, be mediocre at best at the rest. So... if you can tell me what you want out of your bard, then I can tell you what choices would be best for that. If youw ant a second opinion you are welcome to ask our resident forum bard expert Talya (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/member.php?21460-Talya).

[Telonius]

There's a pretty good discussion of Virtuoso and Sublime Chord here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?164922-3-5-Extreme-disappointment-in-Virtuoso). It's from a few years back, and TG Oskar hit most of the points already, but just to show some more of the reasoning behind it. I think Eldariel's quote encapsulates it:


Virtuoso is the Eldritch Knight here; it doesn't gain any stellar abilities of its own but it combines all the things you care about. That makes it worthwhile. Honestly, two points of Inspire Courage is quickly +4d6 damage from Dragonfire Inspiration, +4 damage and +4 to hit from normal Inspiration; when multiplied for the whole party, that can be quite a lot.

[The Insanity]

Bard 5/Druid 1/Greensinger 2/Rogue 2/Sublime Chord 2/Foclucan Lyrist 8 nets you 15th level Bardic Music, 10th level SCh casting and 11th level Druid casting. It can be even better with some optimization, for example if you will be allowed to use a Ring of Evasion for meeting Lyrist's prereqs. If yes then you can replace those two Rogue levels with more Greensinger levels, which would make it 17th level Bardic Music and 13th level Druid casting (plus two more levels of Bard casting).

[Darrin]

Bard 6/ Lyric Thaumaturge 4/Sublime Chord 10


This is similar to a build I was fiddling around with... I wanted to combine Sonic Might from Lyric Thaumaturge 5 with Persistent Spell and some other metamagic shenanigans:

Race: Silverbrow Human
Bard 5/Lyric Thaumaturge 5/Sublime Chord 2/Incantatrix 8
Feats:
Favored (1st), Melodic Casting (1st)
Primary Contact (3rd)
Extend Spell (6th)
Persistent Spell (9th)
Iron Will (12th)
Metamagic Song (15th)
Energy Substitution (18th)

...but there weren't enough feats to get in everything I wanted, like Born of Three Thunders, Quick Recovery, Practical Metamagic, Arcane Thesis, etc. If you have access to flaws, retraining/psychic reformation, Otyugh Hole, Dark Chaos Shuffle, etc., then it might work, but it still takes an awful long time to get everything working.

[Rebel7284]

It would be much better if Lyric Thaumaturge could add the bonus spells to the Sublime Chord list. With that said, while your Inspire Courage suffers, you still have plenty of uses of inspire courage and ways to use them (Metamagic Song). You can also add more ways, such as Snowflake Wardance.

Sublime Chord abilities still ARE pretty lackluster after the first 2 levels. A more limited Time Hop that requires concentration at character level 16? The ability to deal trivial FIRE damage at character level 20? Wizard BAB/Saves? Just not worth it staying in the class if you can do anything else.